Last day of vacation , nine days without that four letter word we won't mention, but now it's almost over. Of course it's 99 degrees outside with a heat index of 107 , definitely too hot to go fishing...so like an idiot I went fishing. Even Joe didn't want to get up and go with me , he just looked at me like "are you fu?$@!ng crazy, it's so hot I don't even want to go outside to piss let alone go fishing!"....so I was solo on this mission.
Got to my favorite mudhole and found a few mayflies in the area (hex's I believe?).
Definitely no lack of food for those shallow water hoovers , I'm sure the hatching bugs were a smorgasbord for em. A short walk and I started seeing a few fish tailing and it wasn't long until the small dark fly I was using got the attention of one of them. Many thanks to Kevin from FlyWatersEdge for being the tyer of said fly. (Told you I'd get a picture of that fly in a fishes mouth!) Not a big fish but who's complaining?
I fished a pretty good amount of water in that first area and had a few missed takes..one break off and ended up catching one more carp and a drum before moving on.
It was the middle of the afternoon and the sun was blazing so I needed a quick break from the heat anyway. This summertime carping is hard work you know.
Just a quick note on beverage choice during this kind of heat , those in the know suggest water (not a bad choice) but my recomendation is to simply scale back to a beer that's 90% water.
None of those heavy IPA's or belgian wheats when hydration's an issue.. stick with a good old Bud Light to assure that your body's getting all the water it needs (if I close my eyes I can almost imagine that it is water!).
After a short air conditioned ride to the next spot, and damn did it feel good , I was stalking the shallows once again. More feeding fish here but better water clarity was making it hard to get close enough for any action. Finally I put the fly in just the right spot and I saw the dark shape make a move , set the hook and I'm back in business.
Another average carp for these waters, not big but large enough to stretch the string on a five or six weight nicely. After a good amount of walking and a lot of sweating I ended up with another drum out of this second spot before I threw in the towel.
I was still seeing a few fish but they were getting spookier and I couldn't sight fish effectively due to the amount of sweat that was pouring down my face anyway , where's that bandana when you need one?
I was more than happy with the days end result of 5 fish to hand , not a bad way to finish off a July vacation.
Nice Mayfly pic, did you get a new camera? Glad the fly worked, I'll ty you up a 1/2 doz for the shout out. Definitly right about that beer mostly water, you can tell by the missing taste!!
ReplyDeletePale Ale...yum!!!! Good post, I wish I had one to talk about. Ladoga IN. all next week there is a river close by so I'm taking the gear. Talk to ya!